Marvel’s Avengers is the new favorite game of MeinMMO author Jürgen Horn. During the story, he was looking forward to the heroine Black Widow, but the first date with the fighter was a disaster.
This is how it all started: I am a big fan of the Avengers on screen and besides my favorites Thor and Iron Man, I also find Black Widow fantastic. I like the calm, composed, and cool demeanor of the heroine, who occasionally shows profound emotions and reactions in selected moments.
Also in Marvel’s Avengers I found her portrayal extremely successful. The first scene where you get to know the heroes of the Avengers one by one with the young Kamala Khan on A-Day is telling. Because unlike Cap or Thor, who are honestly impressed by the cute fangirl, Widow shows almost no interest in the excited Kamala.
She comments on their enthusiasm with the absolute minimum of attention and allows herself to be drawn only to a lackluster fist bump before she simply leaves Kamala standing and discusses important matters with Cap among adults. You can really tell that she has no interest in nonsense like A-Day and fan meetings, and is more concerned with the Avengers’ daily business.
I found this scene really strong and was looking forward to when Kamala and Black Widow would meet again later in the game and how that meeting would go.
And just to give you a heads up, it went completely differently than I thought!
By the way, here’s an interview with the actress who plays Black Widow.
Warning: The following text contains spoilers from the story of Marvel’s Avengers!
Who will be the new hero?
This was my expectation: During the story of Marvel’s Avengers, you usually play as Kamala Khan aka Ms. Marvel, who gradually brings the scattered Avengers back together and reinvents the team. It starts with Hulk, and Iron Man is the second to join.
Then there are a few missions where you do not recruit new heroes, but rather get the helicarrier back in shape with the existing team and make contact with the Inhumans living underground.
Since no new heroes had appeared for a long time, I was curious about which of the missing Avengers would come next. I hoped for Thor because I find him really strong. But first, I had to complete another mission with the Inhumans.
This was the mission: Kamala learned that the villains of A.I.M. have imprisoned more Inhumans in a prison and are conducting experiments on them.
However, since the Avengers are not ready and want to postpone the matter, Kamala sets off alone and I, as the player, have to complete the mission with her. Well, I think. I get along well with Kamala; the heroine with the bizarre rubber limbs plays rather comfortably, and I have leveled her up and equipped her with top gear. This will be a nice story mission, and then I can finally go look for Thor!
This was the big twist: And indeed, the mission goes well. I beat up the annoying A.I.M. bots left and right. But then the situation escalates, and Kamala is so hard pressed by the enemies that she completely exhausts herself in a cut scene and falls unconscious.
She is then picked up by A.I.M. and taken to a cell. A last A.I.M. soldier supervises this, and when everyone is gone, “he” takes off the helmet and it is… Black Widow!
“Wow,” I said out loud, because that is really a surprise. I had expected to sneak out of the cell as Kamala in an extensive stealth episode and then escape from the prison.
Instead, I am now playing immediately and without warning a new heroine and supposed to rescue Kamala with her. But my joy is short-lived, as after some sneaking, Widow’s cover is blown at some point, and the first big fight takes place.
Joy turns to anger
This is why it was no fun: I had played Widow shortly in the tutorial mission right at the beginning, but the fights with her were mostly a scripted boss fight that you could hardly lose.
Now, however, the metaphorical training wheels are off, and without much explanation, I have to prove myself with a totally new heroine. I have absolutely no idea what Widow can do in particular, but I quickly realize what she cannot do. Namely, take damage.
Black Widow is not the Hulk: Just a few hits and the cool assassin falls over. Since I prefer to play brutal brawlers like Hulk, the gameplay of Widow is the complete opposite of what I usually enjoy.
Every little mistake is severely punished, and time and again I go down and have to start all over again. This is frustrating because I actually have very little time to play, and every minute is valuable! And every second I stare at the loading screen after yet another stupid A.I.M. bot has knocked me down makes me angrier.
I’m about to turn into the Hulk myself, and my poor Stadia controller is about to be thrown against the wall and shatter into a thousand pieces. But I hold myself back and try again and again. It’s so frustrating. Black Widow is just a heroine for professionals. While Hulk or Kamala can casually take a few hits, with Widow, every evade jump and every block needs to be perfect.
This is how hard it is to play Black Widow: Only in this way does Widow gain her “intrinsic energy”, a value that gives her a huge bonus on damage and with which she uses one of her skills. But if you take even a tiny bit of damage, everything is lost, and you stand there with zero energy. You can only recharge the energy in combat.
This means you must play extremely aggressively as Widow, but you cannot, like with Hulk, go wild in a destructive smash orgy. Rather, you have to be alert and fully engaged not to lose everything and probably end up in the dust soon.
This is really not the gameplay I prefer, and when the wretched mission was finally over, I put down the gamepad trembling and needed some time to calm down. Just to then get worrying blood pressure values again in the subsequent training mission with Widow.
No, dear Black Widow, in Marvel’s Avengers, we will not be friends anymore. But you are welcome to support me as an AI companion in future missions. By the way, my colleague Maik Schneider, who gets along much better with Black Widow, explains here what he likes about Marvel’s Avengers.
